January 24, 2026 — Federal agents detained 10-year-old Karla Tiul Baltazar and her father, Arnoldo Tiul Caal, after a school drop-off in Spokane, Washington and transferred them to a Texas detention center, a case that drew sharp criticism from Washington state leaders as of January 24, 2026.
Karla Tiul Baltazar, a student at Logan Elementary School, and Arnoldo Tiul Caal were taken to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, after being ordered to report to Border Patrol the day after the encounter, advocates and elected officials said.
The detention of a 10-year-old Spokane girl has become a flashpoint in Washington state, with officials arguing that the family has deep ties to the community and an active asylum case, while federal officials offered broader statements this week emphasizing that asylum claims do not shield people from enforcement.
On January 9, 2026, federal agents stopped Tiul Caal shortly after he dropped Karla at Logan Elementary School in Spokane, Washington.
Agents initially allowed Tiul Caal to pick up his daughter from school, then ordered both father and daughter to report to the Border Patrol office in North Spokane the following morning, January 10.
After that reporting requirement, authorities transported the pair out of Washington state custody and moved them to detention in Texas, advocates said. The family ended up at the South Texas Family Residential Center.
Federal agencies did not publicly issue a case-specific announcement about the Tiul family. U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the Department of Homeland Security also did not provide Spokane-specific answers in response to interview requests, local coverage reported.
During the same week, however, a DHS spokesperson addressed family detentions in broader terms amid other cases, including a Portland family.
“Any application for asylum does not preclude immigration enforcement. The law requires those in the country illegally claiming asylum to be detained pending removal. You can look it up in the statute,” the spokesperson said, according to The Spokesman-Review.
The Chronicle reported that local and national CBP officials did not respond to specific interview requests about the Spokane case as of January 23, 2026.
Karla and her father have lived in Spokane for six years after arriving from Guatemala, advocates and officials said. Their case includes an active asylum claim with a scheduled court date in 2027.
Tiul Caal holds a valid work permit and a Social Security number, advocates said. Volunteer advocate Olga Lucia Herrera said no criminal history has been reported.
Herrera said the enforcement likely stemmed from technical issues, including phone troubles that delayed a mandatory holiday check-in. The description has been central to advocates’ arguments that the detention followed a compliance problem rather than any criminal allegation.
Washington officials and advocates have also focused on the family’s procedural posture, saying the pending asylum case and future court date in 2027 show the family remains in the legal process rather than attempting to avoid it.
The case unfolded as federal authorities resumed family detention practices, including use of the Dilley facility. The South Texas Family Residential Center was closed in 2024 and reopened in 2025 under the current administration to facilitate a “mass deportation” campaign, the material said.
Advocates alleged that Tiul Caal faced pressure while in custody. They said he was coerced into signing voluntary departure papers under the threat of being separated from his daughter if he did not comply, The Spokesman-Review reported.
Supporters pointed to other reported cases in January 2026, including families in Minnesota and Oregon, where individuals with active asylum cases and no criminal records were detained and sent to Texas. They presented those cases as evidence of a broader enforcement push that reaches beyond people with criminal convictions.
Washington Governor Bob Ferguson condemned the detention on January 23, 2026, and framed it as inconsistent with President Trump’s stated enforcement priorities.
“President Trump says he’s going after criminals—tell me what crime this 10-year-old committed. Spokane has been her home since she was four while her dad sought asylum. Now she’s in a detention facility in Texas. This is wrong and un-American,” Ferguson said.
U.S. Senator Patty Murray also criticized the detention on January 23, 2026, pointing to the father’s work and the child’s time in the United States.
“This week the Trump administration decided to detain a hardworking roofer with a 10-year-old daughter who’s lived in America the majority of her life. Trump isn’t going after criminals or the ‘worst of the worst,’ he’s deporting hardworking people,” Murray said.
Spokane Mayor Lisa Brown described the incident as “another example of the Department of Homeland Security’s overreach.” Brown did not provide further detail in the material about what action she planned to take or what the city asked federal agencies to do.
Elected leaders’ statements reflected political objections and characterizations rather than new procedural information about the family’s immigration case. Even so, their comments helped amplify attention on the detention of Karla Tiul Baltazar and on the speed with which the family ended up in Texas.
The detention has also raised concerns about the Dilley facility itself and what it means for a child who had been attending school in Spokane days earlier. Karla is now held at a site that has historically faced litigation over medical neglect and substandard conditions, advocates said.
Advocates described Karla as fearful during the transfer to Texas. They reported that the child was “afraid of missing school” and “afraid of being separated” as she and her father were moved through custody and out of Washington.
A March 2026 court hearing is expected to determine their immediate future in the Dilley facility, advocates said. The material did not describe which court would hold the hearing or the specific legal issues that will be decided beyond their near-term custody and placement.
The family’s Spokane ties formed a central part of the political reaction. Ferguson said Spokane had been Karla’s home since she was four, a detail he used to argue the detention conflicted with claims that enforcement would focus on criminals.
Murray’s statement emphasized Tiul Caal’s work as a roofer and described Karla as a child who has lived in America the majority of her life, tying the case to wider concerns about who federal enforcement targets.
The DHS spokesperson’s statement, by contrast, asserted that filing for asylum does not prevent enforcement and cited a statutory requirement to detain those “in the country illegally claiming asylum” pending removal. The spokesperson’s comments did not mention the Tiul family directly.
While the Spokane case gained attention locally, its national resonance also flowed from the reopening of the South Texas Family Residential Center and the broader debate over family detention. The facility’s closure in 2024 and reopening in 2025 have featured in advocates’ arguments about a shift in federal approach.
Advocates’ allegations about coercion and threats of separation were central to their criticism of enforcement tactics, but the material did not include a response from DHS or CBP addressing those specific claims about voluntary departure paperwork.
The Chronicle’s account that CBP officials did not respond to interview requests as of January 23, 2026, left key questions unanswered about why agents stopped Tiul Caal after the school drop-off and why authorities directed the family to report the next day before transferring them to Texas.
Even without an agency explanation, the timeline described by advocates and officials has remained consistent: a stop after the January 9 school drop-off, permission to retrieve the child, an order to report on January 10, and a transfer chain that ended at the Dilley detention complex.
Advocates have used the reported details of Tiul Caal’s work authorization and Social Security number to argue that he had been living openly while his asylum case proceeded. They also pointed to Herrera’s claim that the trigger involved technical issues around a check-in requirement.
Ferguson and Murray went further, using the case to challenge the administration’s rhetoric about targeting criminals. Both officials framed Karla’s detention alongside claims that the family had no criminal record, though the material did not include a government record or agency statement confirming the absence of criminal history.
For Spokane residents following the case, the immediate question now centers on what happens next for Karla and her father and whether they remain together while detained. Advocates said they fear the possibility of separation, a concern they linked to their allegation that officials used separation threats to pressure voluntary departure.
Official government updates in cases like this typically appear through DHS and CBP newsroom channels, while statements from Washington state government appear through the governor’s office. Those channels have been the main reference points for official comment as of January 24, 2026, while the most detailed accounts of the family’s stop, reporting order and transfer have come from advocates and local coverage.
Federal Agents Detain 10-Year-Old Spokane Girl Karla Tiul Baltazar to Texas Detention Center
Federal agents in Spokane detained a 10-year-old girl and her father, transferring them to a Texas facility despite their active asylum status and community ties. Washington officials have slammed the move as ‘un-American,’ while federal authorities maintain that asylum claims do not preclude enforcement. The case has sparked a wider debate regarding the reopening of family detention centers and the targeting of individuals without criminal records.
